Next To Last Color on the Mergansers and Bufflehead Woodcut

Red-breasted and Common Mergansers with Bufflehead at Flat Rock Dam. Nearly Finished State of Two-block Woodcut by Ken Januski.

In a way it's silly to show this woodcut in it's current state. That's because the black block, which is so important to the mergansers in particular has not yet been printed on it. But I thought some readers might be interested in seeing it from my perspective, before I print the black block which I hope will pull it all together.

Those white spaces on the mergansers are particularly bothersome but they'll disappear when I print the black block. This is the print on good paper by the way, Shin Torinoko. So the print will look largely like this except for whatever changes the black block brings about.

In my proofs I haven't been happy with the black. I'm not quite sure if that is due to the ink or not, my last tube of Daniel Smith Water-Soluble black ink. As a test I'll probably at least try the other water-soluble black ink I have, from Caligo. I haven't used it in at least a year. But I do want to make sure that the black I print prints fully and doesn't leave any faint inking as it has on my proofs. It if takes a different ink to get full saturation of the black then that's what I'll use.

I do hope I can finish this before I get distracted by all sorts of new migrants, and other of the distractions of a long sought after spring. Related to that, our witch hazel is finally in bloom, about a month later than usual!